WikiLeaks

WikiLeaks
1Graphic of hourglass, coloured in blue and grey; a circular map of the eastern hemisphere of the world drips from the top to bottom chamber of the hourglass.
The logo of WikiLeaks, an hourglass with a globe leaking from top to bottom
Screenshot
Screenshot of WikiLeaks' main page as of 19 November 2023
Type of site
Document archive and disclosure
Available inEnglish[a]
OwnerSunshine Press
Founder(s)Julian Assange
Key peopleJulian Assange (director)
Kristinn Hrafnsson (editor-in-chief)
Sarah Harrison (journalist)
URLwikileaks.org
CommercialNo
RegistrationOptional[1][2]
Launched4 October 2006; 18 years ago (2006-10-04)
Trump–Russia relations
Business interactions
Russian election interference
Investigations and reports
People
Deception and conspiracy theories
Literature
Categories

WikiLeaks (/ˈwɪkiliːks/) is a non-profit media organisation and publisher of leaked documents. It is funded by donations[13] and media partnerships. It has published classified documents and other media provided by anonymous sources.[14] It was founded in 2006 by Julian Assange.[15] Kristinn Hrafnsson is its editor-in-chief.[16][17] Its website states that it has released more than ten million documents and associated analyses.[18] WikiLeaks' most recent publication of original documents was in 2019 and its most recent publication was in 2021.[19] From November 2022, numerous documents on the organisation's website became inaccessible.[19][20] In 2023, Assange said that WikiLeaks is no longer able to publish due to his imprisonment and the effect that US government surveillance and WikiLeaks' funding restrictions were having on potential whistleblowers.[21]

WikiLeaks has released document caches and media that exposed serious violations of human rights and civil liberties by various governments. It released footage of the 12 July 2007 Baghdad airstrike, titling it Collateral Murder, in which Iraqi Reuters journalists and several civilians were killed by a U.S. helicopter crew.[22] It published thousands of US military field logs from the war in Afghanistan and Iraq war, diplomatic cables from the United States and Saudi Arabia,[23][24] and emails from the governments of Syria[25][26] and Turkey.[27][28][29] WikiLeaks has also published documents exposing corruption in Kenya[30][31] and at Samherji,[32] cyber warfare and surveillance tools created by the CIA,[33][34] and surveillance of the French president by the National Security Agency.[35][36] During the 2016 U.S. presidential election campaign, WikiLeaks released emails from the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and from Hillary Clinton's campaign manager, showing that the party's national committee had effectively acted as an arm of the Clinton campaign during the primaries, seeking to undercut the campaign of Bernie Sanders. These releases resulted in the resignation of the chairwoman of the DNC and caused significant harm to the Clinton campaign.[37] During the campaign, WikiLeaks promoted false conspiracy theories about Hillary Clinton, the Democratic Party and the murder of Seth Rich.[38][39][40]

WikiLeaks has won numerous awards and been commended by media organisations, civil society organisations, and world leaders for exposing state and corporate secrets, increasing transparency, assisting freedom of the press, and enhancing democratic discourse while challenging powerful institutions. The organisation has been the target of campaigns to discredit it, including aborted ones by Palantir and HBGary. WikiLeaks has also had its donation systems interrupted by payment processors. As a result, the Wau Holland Foundation helps process WikiLeaks' donations.

The organisation has been criticised for inadequately curating content and violating personal privacy. WikiLeaks has, for instance, revealed Social Security numbers, medical information, credit card numbers and details of suicide attempts.[41][42][43] News organisations, activists, journalists and former members have also criticised WikiLeaks over allegations of anti-Clinton and pro-Trump bias and a lack of internal transparency. Some journalists have alleged it had associations with the Russian government. Journalists have also criticised the organisation for promotion of conspiracy theories, and what they describe as exaggerated and misleading descriptions of the contents of leaks. The US CIA and United States Congress characterised the organisation as a "non-state hostile intelligence service" after the release of CIA tools for hacking consumer electronics in Vault 7.[44]


Cite error: There are <ref group=lower-alpha> tags or {{efn}} templates on this page, but the references will not show without a {{reflist|group=lower-alpha}} template or {{notelist}} template (see the help page).

  1. ^ "Log in - our.wikileaks.org". our.wikileaks.org. Archived from the original on 12 July 2023. Retrieved 12 July 2023.
  2. ^ "Getting Started - our.wikileaks.org". our.wikileaks.org. Archived from the original on 29 May 2024. Retrieved 12 July 2023.
  3. ^ Cardoso, Gustavo; Jacobetty, Pedro (2012). "Surfing the Crisis: Cultures of Belonging and Networked Social Change". In Castells, Manuel; Caraça, João; Cardoso, Gustavo (eds.). Aftermath: The Cultures of the Economic Crisis. Oxford: Oxford University Press. pp. 177–209. ISBN 9780199658411. Archived from the original on 29 May 2024. Retrieved 9 May 2023. WikiLeaks is also based on an openness culture, as it is a crowd-sourced, crowd-funded non-profit organization operating internationally.
  4. ^ Pogrebna, Ganna; Skilton, Mark (2019). Navigating New Cyber Risks: How Businesses Can Plan, Build and Manage Safe Spaces in the Digital Age. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave MacMillan. p. 2. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-13527-0. ISBN 9783030135270. S2CID 197966404. Archived from the original on 8 May 2023. Retrieved 7 May 2023. WikiLeaks is an international non profit organization that receives and subsequently shares on its website confidential documents from large organizations or governments.
  5. ^ Braccini, Alessio Maria; Federici, Tommaso (2013). "New Internet-Based Relationships Between Citizens". In Baskerville, Richard; De Marco, Marco; Spagnoletti, Paolo (eds.). Designing Organizational Systems: An Interdisciplinary Discourse. Berlin: Springer Nature. pp. 157–179. doi:10.1007/978-3-642-33371-2. ISBN 978-3-642-33370-5. Archived from the original on 9 May 2023. Retrieved 7 May 2023. Julian Assange had introduced a new term into the lexicon of several generations. This term was 'WikiLeaks' and described an international non-profit organisation, committed to publishing secret information, news leaks, and classified media provided by anonymous sources.
  6. ^ Hindman, Elizabeth Blanks; Thomas, Ryan J (June 2014). "When Old and New Media Collide: The Case of WikiLeaks". New Media & Society. 16 (4). SAGE Publishing: 541–558. doi:10.1177/1461444813489504. ISSN 1461-4448. S2CID 30711318. WikiLeaks was founded in 2006 as an international non-profit organization specializing in the publication of 'classified, censored or otherwise restricted material of political, diplomatic or ethical significance' obtained via anonymous sources
  7. ^ Dodds, Klaus J. (2012). "The WikiLeaks Arctic Cables". Polar Record. 48 (2). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: 199–201. Bibcode:2012PoRec..48..199D. doi:10.1017/S003224741100043X. S2CID 129682201. With a keen sense of timing, given the Greenlandic and Danish governments' hosting of the 7th Arctic Council ministerial meeting, seven 'sensitive' US diplomatic cables were leaked by WikiLeaks, an international non-profit organisation that publishes materials from anonymous sources, news leaks, and whistleblowers
  8. ^ Benkler, Yochai (2011). "A Free Irresponsible Press: Wikileaks and the Battle over the Soul of the Networked Fourth Estate". Harvard Civil Rights–Civil Liberties Law Review. 46 (2). Cambridge: Harvard Law School: 311–397. Archived from the original on 19 December 2023. Retrieved 9 May 2023 – via Harvard Library. Wikileaks is a nonprofit that depends on donations from around the world to fund its operation. A second system that came under attack on a model parallel to the attack on technical infrastructure was the payment system... Like the Sunlight Foundation and similar transparency-focused organizations, Wikileaks is a nonprofit focused on bringing to light direct, documentary evidence about government behavior so that many others, professional and otherwise, can analyze the evidence and search for instances that justify public criticism.
  9. ^ Fuchs, Christian (2014). "WikiLeaks: Can We Make Power Transparent?". Social Media: A Critical Introduction. London/Thousand Oaks: SAGE Publishing. pp. 210–233. ISBN 978-1-4462-5730-2. Archived from the original on 9 January 2023. Retrieved 9 May 2023. WikiLeaks (www.wikileaks.org) is a non-commercial and non-profit Internet whistleblowing platform that has been online since 2006. Julian Assange founded it. It is funded by online donations.
  10. ^ Beckett, Charlie (2012). Wikileaks: News in the Networked Era. Cambridge: Wiley. p. 26. ISBN 978-0-745-65975-6. WikiLeaks is independent of commercial, corporate, government or lobbygroup control or ownership. It is a non-membership, non-profit organisation funded by donations
  11. ^ Flesher Fominaya, Cristina (2020). Social Movements in a Globalized World (Second ed.). London: Bloomsbury Publishing. p. 177. ISBN 9781352009347. Archived from the original on 13 July 2023. Retrieved 9 May 2023. As a non-profit organization, Wikileaks is funded by crowdfunding donations, which were subsequently blocked by PayPal, Mastercard, a Swiss Bank and Bank of America in protest over their political activity, a troubling example of 'the ability of private infrastructure companies to restrict speech without being bound by the constraints of legality, and the possibility that government actors will take advantage of this affordance in an extra-legal public-private partnership for censorship'.
  12. ^ Daly, Angela (2014). "The Privatization of the Internet, WikiLeaks and Free Expression". International Journal of Communication. 8. Los Angeles: USC Annenberg Press: 2693–2703. SSRN 2496707. Archived from the original on 12 May 2023. Retrieved 9 May 2023 – via European University Institute. In late 2010, the online nonprofit media organization WikiLeaks published classified documents detailing correspondence between the U.S. State Department and its diplomatic missions around the world, numbering around 250,000 cables.
  13. ^ [3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12]
  14. ^ "WikiLeaks". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 30 January 2016. Retrieved 17 April 2022.
  15. ^ McGreal, Chris (5 April 2010). "Wikileaks reveals video showing US air crew shooting down Iraqi civilians". The Guardian. London. Archived from the original on 26 June 2011. Retrieved 15 December 2010.
  16. ^ "WikiLeaks names one-time spokesman as editor-in-chief". Associated Press. Archived from the original on 13 September 2019. Retrieved 26 September 2018.
  17. ^ Bridge, Mark (27 September 2018). "Loss of internet forces Assange to step down from Wikileaks editor role". The Times. Archived from the original on 15 February 2022. Retrieved 11 April 2019.
  18. ^ "What is Wikileaks". WikiLeaks. Archived from the original on 23 October 2016. Retrieved 14 April 2020.[self-published source]
  19. ^ a b "WikiLeaks' Website Is Falling Apart". Gizmodo. 22 November 2022. Archived from the original on 15 April 2024. Retrieved 24 December 2022.
  20. ^ Burgess, Matt. "Apple Tracks You More Than You Think". Wired. ISSN 1059-1028. Archived from the original on 4 November 2023. Retrieved 24 December 2022.
  21. ^ Cite error: The named reference Glass-2024 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  22. ^ "Reporters Sans Frontières – Open letter to Wikileaks founder Julian Assange: A bad precedent for the Internet's future". Archived from the original on 15 August 2010. Retrieved 1 May 2022.
  23. ^ Hubbard, Ben (20 June 2015). "Cables Released by WikiLeaks Reveal Saudis' Checkbook Diplomacy". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 13 May 2019. Retrieved 20 April 2019.
  24. ^ Zorthian, Julia (19 June 2015). "WikiLeaks Begins Releasing Leaked Saudi Arabia Cables". Time. Archived from the original on 21 April 2019. Retrieved 20 April 2019.
  25. ^ "Syria files: Wikileaks releases 2m 'embarrassing' emails". BBC News. 5 July 2012. Archived from the original on 22 July 2022. Retrieved 20 April 2019.
  26. ^ Greenberg, Andy (5 July 2012). "WikiLeaks Announces Massive Release With The 'Syria Files': 2.4 Million Emails From Syrian Officials And Companies". Forbes. Archived from the original on 10 July 2012. Retrieved 20 April 2019.
  27. ^ Yeung, Peter (20 July 2016). "President Erdogan emails: What is in the Wikileaks release about Turkey's government?". The Independent. Archived from the original on 22 April 2019. Retrieved 20 April 2019.
  28. ^ Doctorow, Cory (29 July 2016). "Wikileaks' dump of "Erdogan emails" turn out to be public mailing list archives". BoingBoing. Archived from the original on 21 April 2019. Retrieved 20 April 2019.
  29. ^ Gramer, Robbie (7 December 2016). "Latest Wikileaks Dump Sheds New Light on Erdogan's Power In Turkey". Foreign Policy. Archived from the original on 3 May 2019. Retrieved 20 April 2019.
  30. ^ Dahir, Abdi Latif (13 April 2019). "It all started in Nairobi: How Kenya gave Julian Assange's WikiLeaks its first major global scoop". Quartz Africa. Archived from the original on 3 July 2019. Retrieved 20 April 2019.
  31. ^ Rice, Xan (31 August 2007). "The looting of Kenya". The Guardian. Archived from the original on 31 January 2008. Retrieved 20 April 2019.
  32. ^ PPLAAF (7 March 2022). "The Fishrot scandal". pplaaf.org. Archived from the original on 29 May 2024. Retrieved 13 March 2022.
  33. ^ Menn, Joseph (29 March 2017). "A scramble at Cisco exposes uncomfortable truths about U.S. cyber defense". Reuters. Archived from the original on 8 May 2019. Retrieved 20 April 2019.
  34. ^ Shane, Scott; Rosenberg, Matthew; Lehren, Andrew W. (7 March 2017). "WikiLeaks Releases Trove of Alleged C.I.A. Hacking Documents". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 7 March 2017. Retrieved 20 April 2019.
  35. ^ Regan, James; John, Mark (23 June 2015). "NSA spied on French presidents: WikiLeaks". Reuters. Archived from the original on 21 April 2019. Retrieved 20 April 2019.
  36. ^ Rubin, Alyssa J.; Shane, Scott (24 June 2015). "Hollande Condemns Spying by U.S., but Not Too Harshly". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 21 April 2019. Retrieved 20 April 2019.
  37. ^ "Why it's entirely predictable that Hillary Clinton's emails are back in the news". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on 20 June 2018. Retrieved 12 November 2016.
  38. ^ Ohlheiser, Abby (4 November 2016). "No, John Podesta didn't drink bodily fluids at a secret Satanist dinner". The Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. Archived from the original on 14 January 2021. Retrieved 8 November 2016.
  39. ^ "WikiLeaks Fuels Conspiracy Theories About DNC Staffer's Death". NBC News. Archived from the original on 12 February 2021. Retrieved 8 November 2016. WikiLeaks ... is fueling Internet conspiracy theories by offering a $20,000 reward for information on a Democratic National Committee staffer who was killed last month ... in what police say was robbery gone wrong ... Assange implied this week in an interview that Rich was the source of the leak and even offered a $20,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of his murderer. Meanwhile, the Russian government funded propaganda outlet RT had already been covering Rich's murder two weeks prior. RT and other Russian government propaganda outlets have also been working hard to deny the Russian government was the source of the leak, including by interviewing Assange about the Rich murder. ... The original conspiracy theory can be traced back to a notoriously unreliable conspiracy website
  40. ^ Chafkin, Max; Silver, Vernon (10 October 2016). "How Julian Assange turned WikiLeaks into Trump's best friend". Bloomberg. Archived from the original on 9 November 2016. Retrieved 17 April 2022.
  41. ^ Brustein, Joshua (29 July 2016). "Why Wikileaks Is Losing Its Friends". Bloomberg. Archived from the original on 21 July 2019. Retrieved 6 January 2017.
  42. ^ Satter, Raphael; Michael, Maggie (23 August 2016). "Private lives are exposed as WikiLeaks spills its secrets". Associated Press. Archived from the original on 7 January 2017. Retrieved 6 January 2017.
  43. ^ Peterson, Andrea. "Snowden and WikiLeaks clash over leaked Democratic Party emails". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on 22 August 2016. Retrieved 28 July 2016.
  44. ^ "U.S. prosecution of alleged WikiLeaks 'Vault 7' source hits multiple roadblocks". news.yahoo.com. 6 October 2021. Archived from the original on 7 October 2021. Retrieved 16 October 2022.